What does it mean to be British?

Today, we had a special assembly focussing on 'what it means to be British?'. We discussed why we are so special. The children were challenged on their perceptions of British and what it means to be a British citizen.

We discussed how God created us in his image. We discussed how everyone in the world is similar - we are humans, we have feelings, we have emotions, we are all born and eventually die etc. However, we are ALL different. The children were eager to discuss why we are unique and used our knowledge from our belief boulevard day to discuss how people are NOT all equal. We have some people who have no home, they have limited food and have very few belongings. We are similar because we are humans, but we do not have the same rights and are treated unequally.

The children were introduced to the colour of people's skin and how religion, or being British, doesn't rely on the colour of people's skin. We challenged the perception of being British and being a Christian. We discussed how religion, language and appearance does not influence whether we are British or not. We discussed that we can describe people by the colour of their skin and it is very important to do so in certain circumstances - like when reporting to the police.

However - there are some words which are NOT kind and we do not use them. The children were challenged to words used in the past often in a derogatory way towards people from different cultural backgrounds and what that meant. Similarly, words used in the past to describe mixed race people is also not acceptable - mixed race is.

We focused on how we can show respect to others, and sometimes we use words that we do not fully understand. We need to be responsible for how we make other people feel and by following our British Values. We have a choice and make a choice every single day. We decide how we are going to make the people around us feel.

We are all similar - we are a community; we are a family; we are a school family; we are God's family.

The children were so engaged and eager to share their thoughts and opinions. It was extremely useful and an interesting way to think about how we follow British values and try to ensure everyone is happy and loved, regardless of gender, colour or religion.